The Lucky One, by Nicholas Sparks

The charge ran out on my Kindle while I was on vacation, and I had forgotten my charger. The rental home we were in had this book on the shelf, and I thought it would be an easy beach read. It was. The plot was perfectly entertaining for a lazy day at the beach. I enjoyed it just fine. But what a poorly written wreck of a book! Either Sparks is a moron or he thinks I am. I rolled my eyes right off the bat when there was a mystery woman known to the main character only as "E," and then a character popped up shortly thereafter named "Beth." He could have put a *little* more mystery into that one! Even reversing it would have been trickier (i.e. a mystery woman named "B" and a character named Elizabeth).

This was my first Sparks book I've ever read, and I'd like to say it was my last. But who knows when else I might get stranded on a beach without a Kindle.

City of Thieves, by David Benioff

This book tells the story of what appears to be (based on the first chapter) the author's grandfather in St. Petersburg during the 900-day German siege on Russia in WWII. This book is a positively fantastic adventure. The writer's voice is absolutely perfect. It is set amidst horrible, tragic events, but the story is told without the slightest hint of melodrama. Benioff reminds you of how awful things were, but in creative ways that are relevant to the story line without ramming it down your throat. For example, he reminds us of Lev's starvation-thinness by his fear of falling down while running because of his heightened risk of a broken bone.

While the book is highly plot-driven, it is really about the relationship between the two main characters, Lev and Kolya, who get sent on a near-impossible mission together by a Russian army official. Lev is a naive boy; Kolya is a conceited playboy with very few reservations. The character of Kolya opens up beautifully throughout the book, though, and he is instrumental in Lev's coming of age. I cared about these characters deeply.

I was incredibly curious about how much of the book is real. I tried doing some research on the main Nazi in the book, but couldn't find anything, leading me to believe names were changed. But then I did some more research and found out, from a Benioff interview, that the book is entirely fictional. Benioff's grandparents were born in the United States. That doesn't change how I feel about the book, though. A good book is a good book.

My only complaint about this book was that it was too short. I loved it. I'm sure we'll see a movie soon, since the author is a main-stream screenwriter.

Little Bee, by Chris Cleave

What a wonderfully written, moving book. I could not put it down. The book is about a teenage Nigerian refugee girl, and a British family with which she is intertwined. Such heavy issues in the book, but told in a light way. As the refugee girl tells us, she smiles when things are terrible because they would be even worse if she did not. I found myself smirking at her ideas for suicide -- that's just wrong, isn't it?!?

This was the perfect combination of present story and flashbacks, told from the voices of the refugee girl and the mother in the British family. I was always 100% engaged with the story being told at any given moment. The book was tremendously sad and powerful. Definitely recommend.

In The Woods, by Tana French

Well, so much for me not liking mystery thrillers. This was a fun, exciting book. It was about two detectives (Cassie and Rob) investigating a child murder in a small Irish town where one of the detectives was from and had experienced childhood trauma. The characters were interesting and believable. Their relationship was complex and did not take the turns that I necessarily expected. The crime itself was a bit predictable - the author could have deleted about 3 sentences of over-foreshadowing from her book. The end of the book was satisfying in its unsatisfying way. Not everything is neat and tidy. It did make me wonder if the author intends to reprise these characters, though. I wouldn't mind; she is a very good writer.

The Blood of Flowers, by Anita Amirrezvani

This book is about a girl from a small village in 17th century Iran that moves to the city. She is a carpet maker, which provides imagery throughout the book as the story is "weaved."

I loved this book. People are touting it as the female counterpart to The Kite Runner. I compeltely disagree; that comparison does not do this book justice. The Kite Runner was an enjoyable, but mediocre, tale with far too many neat coincidences. This book is far more real. The protaganist makes some very controversial (for her time and place) decisions, which come with very real consequences, both good and bad. There is no neat, pretty ending, although I found the ending to be very satisfying and beautiful. The plot was always exciting; this was definitely a page turner.

The relationships were so wonderfully complicated in this book. Her cautious love for her friend, and her friend's conditional love for her. Her mother's unconditional but sometimes reserved love for her. The feuding relationship with her caretaker aunt. Her strong desire and equally strong repugnance for the male character. And, my favorite, her relationship with her teacher uncle, which I can't quite describe in a little fragmented sentence.

Each chapter ends with a folk tale. I really liked the stories, but sometimes I rushed through them because I was so anxious to get back to the plot. My favorites were the one about chopping down the rosebush and the last one (about the bird). The author in the notes says that she made up two of the tales (the first and last) and the rest were Iranian folklore. I'm not sure if the rosebush one was first; it might have been. In which case, I obviously like her stories best - her two tales and the substantive novel itself, of course.

I definitely recommend this book.

The Black Tower, by Louis Bayard

This is a historical fiction book set in 19th century Paris after Napoleon has been ousted and the Bourbans have been restored to power. The book is a mystery novel about the lost Dauphin of France, Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette's son. I think there really was mystery about the Dauphin's death, but different than the mystery or location of the Dauphin in the book... I think in real life the Dauphin was supposedly killed by revolutionaries.

I was going to say that I was lukewarm on this book, but that's not quite right. I was hot and cold on this book. I would get bored with it from time to time, would start reading really quickly and poorly, then BAM something would happen and I wouldn't know how it got there. It definitely happened twice, with me saying: "What? He's holding someone's wound as the person dies?" I didn't know who it was that was dying or what the events were leading up to the wound. I gleaned later on that the character was killed. And: "What? His house is on fire?" Not sure how that happened either.

But there were exciting parts too. Most of the end was quite exciting, from the fire onward. Until the very end, which I thought was unsatisfying. The best part of the book was the writing style - lovely imagery. I think my biggest problem with this book is that it's a Sherlock Holmes style murder mystery, a genre that is just not me. I do enjoy a mystery or thriller every now and then (see The Girl Who... series here, and here, and here), but not often.

Freedom, by Jonathan Franzen

I think I liked this more than The Corrections, which was a book I liked very much. But I don't remember much about The Corrections, and I think this plot and these characters will stick with me a little better. Just like The Corrections, Freedom is about a lovely dysfunctional family (well, of course, who would write about a nondysfunctional family?). The parents are Patty and Walter, the kids are Jessica and Joey. Franzen does such a good job of feeding you little anecdotes that really make you understand what makes these characters tick. The timing of the anecdotes was, however, sometimes frustrating. He'd leave me, for example, with a stupendous cliffhanger about Joey for a tangent about Walter's childhood to explain why nature was so important to Walter. Grrrrrrrrrr! I know that he's trying to leave the reader hungry, but the effect on me was to read the tangent way more quickly than it deserved. He also gave wonderful physical descriptions of the characters (except Jessica). The best was Richard Katz, who he simply described as looking like Muammar Gaddafi. Franzen had no way of knowing when he wrote the book how familiar all of America would be with the face of Gaddafi at this particular moment in time!

Plot-wise, this book absolutely did it for me. Loved it. I cared about everything that was going on. He weaved in so many issues into his plot (e.g. mountaintop removal mining, overpopulation, Iraq defense contracting, etc. etc. etc.), it was fascinating. I loved the characters too. There were so many things about these people that I could relate to myself or someone close to me. In fact, there were parts that evoked a little too much self reflection for my liking! Oh, and speaking of self reflection, I guess I could complain that Franzen made his characters a little TOO self-aware to be realistic. No one understands himself quite that well! But it was a great tool for us readers to understand the characters.

The only thing I didn't absolutely love was the amount of sexual description. I'm not totally a prude, but I am a little bit of one. This just got too much for me about 75% of the way through. Early on, I thought he dealt with sex really well. But it just got too in my face as the book went on. It was an important part of the book and I don't want to eliminate it; I just could have gone for some editing there.

Overall, an A from me. Definitely recommend.